Taking Comfort in Looping Videos with @nataliastuyk

For more of Natalia’s looping videos, follow @nataliastuyk on Instagram.

“There’s a comfort in things that loop. I think that as a species we’re drawn to things that are innately hypnotic,” says London-based digital designer Natalia Stuyk (@nataliastuyk ). Natalia creates animated videos and gifs in response to the shapes, textures and colors she sees around her. Her short loops are often silent as they are a work in progress, but she uses sound as the starting point. “I write the soundtracks first, which dictate the rhythm of the movement and cuts of the video,” she says.

Natalia takes inspiration from London as well as her travels. “I grew up in London, so as with any big city nothing is ever totally still or quiet,” she says. “Every few months or so I go back to the south of Spain to see my family, and it’s so tropical there. There are palm trees everywhere and it’s always beautiful. I definitely absorb some of that every time I visit and it’s apparent in the colors and shapes I use for sure.”

Natalia looks at a still image and wonders how it might move, and says she is fascinated with repetition. She admits she is never fully satisfied until she knits together her videos seamlessly. “I like it most when you can’t tell where something starts and ends, it just goes on forever,” she says. “I feel like everything I create has a similar visual rhythm.”

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@joseparla’s Segmented Realities at the High Museum of Art

For more photos and videos of Segmented Realities, explore the High Museum of Art location page and follow @joseparla on Instagram.

Segmented Realities. the latest show of the artist José Parlá (@joseparla ) which is at the High Museum of Art (@highmuseumofart ) in Atlanta, includes new paintings with rich textures, layers and his signature calligraphy. “I am interested in walls I see around the world that allow the viewer to find a clue to their history, but also much more — the history of a place,” he says.

The show, open until May 24, includes two-sided, sculptural pieces in a room at the museum made almost entirely of glass. “The work can be photographed from all angles of the space, as well as from outside,” says José, who lives in Brooklyn. “My favorite time is around 4:30 p.m. when you can photograph your own shadow — or that of a friend — on the surface of one of the sculptures.”

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Nursing Bats Back to Health with @nightingalequilts

This #batweek. learn more about what goes into rehabilitating injured bats by following @nightingalequilts on Instagram.

“Bats are the bees of the mammal world,” says Caroline Greco (@nightingalequilts ), who has nursed back to health more than 30 bats from her home in New South Wales, Australia.

Caroline hopes to demystify and soften perceptions of these creatures among a bat-wary public. “Without them whole ecosystems will collapse, with a domino effect passing on to human society,” she says.

The bats in Caroline’s care are not pets. She’s specially trained to know the rehabilitative needs of each rescued bat so that it can be returned to the wild. Handling of adults is kept to a minimum, for instance. And for young bats, a priority is placed on preparing them to interact with others. “We provide them with toys and enrichment to keep their minds active and ensure they develop into well-adjusted juvenile bats ready to learn social skills from adult bats,” says Caroline, adding, “The priority is the animal’s welfare.”

If you encounter an injured bat, says Caroline, the best way to keep yourself and the bat safe is to call local wildlife experts with proper training and vaccinations.

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Ismail Ferdous (@ismailferdous ) is a 26-year-old photojournalist from Dhaka, Bangladesh. His work has taken him around the world, capturing vignettes of life from South East Asia to Latin America to the conflicted border of Turkey and Syria. At home in Bangladesh, he continues to work on a long-term project called “The Cost of Fashion” that began on April 24th, 2013, when a clothing factory collapsed in Dhaka, killing over 1,000 garment workers inside.

“I believe when people really pursue their passions and pursue what they believe in and what they love, and then genuine results will come out of that,” says Ismail. “For me, being a photographer is not just a job but it’s a passion. When I started photography my parents and other people used to tell me I should focus on my business career or that photography is not worthwhile. They said being a photographer is some crazy dream I would never attain. People can be discouraging, and some people listen to them, and they end up not pursuing their passion. But I knew inside that I was going to pursue photography.”

Ismail describes the first steps of his long journey, saying, “when I decided to become a photographer, I knew I wanted to be a documentary photographer. But it took a while to feel confident inside myself that I could do this job. Before I could convince other people I had to convince myself. Eventually I made the decision of what I wanted to do with my life. I started witnessing people’s stories not in an educational point of view, not from afar, but really what happens to people in the course of history. To me, that’s the utmost meaningful experience one can have—and so that’s exactly why I became a photographer.”

Color and Fade

In December’s creative tools update. we introduced five new filters and brought you the ability to tweak perspective as part of the Adjust tool. Today, we bring you two new creative tools: Color and Fade.

Use the Color tool to tint the highlights or shadows in your photo. You can choose from yellow, orange, red, pink, purple, blue, cyan or green to add a colorful flair to the moments you share. The Fade tool allows you to bring a quiet tone to your photos by softening colors.

Instagram for Android version 6.19.0 is available today on Google Play. and Instagram for iOS version 6.10.0 will be available in a few days in Apple’s App Store .

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Absorbing Latin America’s colors through @murnaudenlinden

To see more illustrations from @murnaudenlinden visit his drawing space on Instagram.

“Latin America is like a punch in the nose. It suddenly gets your attention. It startles you,” says Eduardo Lindes Burnao (@murnaudenlinden ), who draws inspiration from that region for his illustrations.

Eduardo, a graphic designer from Spain currently living in London, loves to explore the Latin American culture. “That’s why I use primary, basic colors like yellow or blue because I want people to be shocked by the drawings.”

His grandfather used to listen to folk Latin music and that left a cultural footprint on Eduardo, whose goal now is to build bridges across the Atlantic. “I think Europe still has some unpaid debt with Latin America, and there’s still a lot of ignorance about that region and its important role in the world.”

He hopes his illustrations will help with that. “In this moment, in the world we live in, we need some joy, more color, more flavor.”

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Weekend Hashtag Project: #WHPcandid

Weekend Hashtag Project is a series featuring designated themes and hashtags chosen by Instagram’s Community Team. For a chance to be featured on the Instagram blog, follow @instagram and look for a post announcing the weekend’s project every Friday.